Ms Dervla McKay:

As I said in my opening statement, as a business we only came to Ireland in 2018 and we have grown to a team of nearly 1,000 people. In terms of our ability to recruit from a drivers' perspective, the team does an excellent job. Our pipeline is really strong. We have our 100 people in our school and over 100 who have applied and been accepted. The pipeline there for us is strong. There is a risk that this may run out at a point in time. We always keep a close eye on that. It is an area of huge and consistent focus for our business, but it is strong at the moment. That said, for the roll-out of BusConnects we may need to look at going international over the next few years. We have not pressed the button on that just yet.

As a business we have been extremely challenged in the area of mechanics. We have gone international and have ten mechanics from the Philippines due to join us in November. They were due to join us a little earlier but I understand from my team that there has been a change this year to how the permit system works. That has caused a bit of a delay in the system, adding about six weeks to what we originally thought it would take. Those mechanics are due to join us in November which will help hugely.

We have some ongoing dialogue with SOLAS on the upskilling of LGV mechanics to HGV mechanics. That is an area that could help and support us. As with Mr. Hann, we are also focusing strongly on the future of qualified mechanics. We had over 300 applications for our apprenticeship programme this year. This is a massive number for us and our biggest to date. We had four additional mechanics join us from-----